


Milk, Tea, Vodka?

by Yuurei



Category: James Bond (Craig movies)
Genre: A sliding scale of of really low to really high, Bird of prey! Q, Cat!James, Don't copy to another site, Humans with animal attributes, Humor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-20
Updated: 2019-10-20
Packaged: 2020-12-27 05:01:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,497
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21113066
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Yuurei/pseuds/Yuurei
Summary: Just a bit of humour late at night in Q branch with our favourite boys.





	Milk, Tea, Vodka?

**Author's Note:**

  * For [MinMu](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MinMu/gifts).

> For MinMu who got me thinking about 00Q plot bunnies without which this wouldn't exist.
> 
> So this verse is basically people have animal attributes that affect their physical body and behaviour patterns. Some have overt (high end) Attributes some are subtle(low end) and everything in between.
> 
> Aka "The Cat that brought the cream (thanks Dart)" "The Cat that always comes back" "The Cat that caught the... Raptor?!" "The Nine Lives of Seven" "  
There are way too many joke titles for this.

There was a prickle down his spine that didn't dissipate that eventual drove Q to surface from the latest bout of coding that had garnered his attention. His eyes flashed upward, hazel split pupils quickly scanning the room catching on a shadow that didn't belong but that was none-the-less quite familiar. He drew his hand back from the small gun that had been carefully hidden but seemingly just thrown amongst the general detritus on his desk and settled for a mild disgruntled glare. 

Having been spotted the shadow unfurled from its perch and hopped down to floor level. Luckily it was late enough in the evening that the action went unnoticed by the tired few others that were present and didn't cause a stir. Bond approached slowly sipping absent mindedly from the cup he was only loosely holding despite the drop down he'd taken with it only moments earlier. 

Q sighed tiredly. "I should have known you were back without actually signing in, 007. The minions told me my tea would be black until they went to the shops again but this morning there was plenty of milk." Q tipped his mug of dark tea a bit in the direction of Bond's stolen goods. "I don't suppose you're inclined to share a splash of that?" Bond's triangular ears twitched as he canted his head considering Q's outstretched tea and Q remained still waiting for the verdict. 

Some said Bond's unmoving stare was unnerving; a never shifting, large predator's gaze despite having distinctly house cat attributes. Q found the slow blinks Bond gave him at times were somehow cute despite coming from an almost six foot wall of muscle.

Admittedly, he knew little about Cat Attributes so a fair bit of Bond's demeanour seemed odd but somewhat charming to him a good portion of the time. Despite the general rule that your parents attributes didn't in any way dictate what your own would be Q's parent had both been high end Passive Avian types and had been prone to avoidance of anyone that looked even remotely predatory to them and Q's own middle ground Raptor attributes had even been too much predator for them to be fully comfortable with once he'd hit double digits in age.

His childhood then, and even young adulthood, had been filled with the nervous prey animal attribute friends of his parents and learned lessons of 'I'm harmless watch me hide my sharp edges'. He'd found it had also served him well in uni and had kept his skills at mimicking his parents notice-me-not just another songbird in full swing. 

Being thrown into the deep end of Q-branch branch, handling the most often times middle to high end Predator Attributes that made up the 00-agents, had been a steep learning curve in modifying his own behaviour to switch easily between 'harmless' with the minions to 'scratch your eyes out if you break that gear' with the majority of the high end agents. 

He was brought out of his introspection by a clinking of porcelain on porcelain as Bond had moved forward silently to tip his cup against Q's own for a moment to transfer some of the stolen milk into his tea. 

Q raised his mug, "Cheers, 007", and took a swig of his lukewarm but now at least milky earl grey. He promptly choked on it. 

A deep rumbling sound emanated from Bond's chest as he watched the quartermaster cough and look at his cup in betrayal. His lips were twitching as he asked, "Not to your tastes, Quartermaster?" 

Q grumbled half heartedly as he dabbled at the tea spittle that had hit his desk. "I'm partial to whiskey over vodka in my tea if you must know." 

Bond grinned outright then and said, "I'll keep that in mind for next time then, shall I?" 

"I suppose you should then if this is to become a habit. Ruined tea is hardly the way I wish to enjoy my evenings." Q cracked a grin then of his own. " Really, James, vodka? Shall I blame Alec and his influence when next I have him on comms?"

Bond grinned then like the cat that got the canary, subtle fangs on display and mischief in his eyes as he said cheerfully, "Well I suppose we could blame Alec. The bottle's from his locker. Can't go wandering about London buying scotch when I'm not officially in the country yet, can I." 

Q wasn't sure if he should laugh or groan. "You mean it's Alec's vodka and he's liable to miss it when he gets back." 

"Well, "Bond said, "he might've missed it if it hadn't been stolen a couple months ago and 009 blamed for its disappearance."

Q groaned then. "That's what that god-aweful racket was about between them? A bottle of vodka?" He thumped his head forward onto his desk then tilted sideways a bit to glare at James. "You realise the joint mission they took had stab wounds and stitches for both of them, right? Before they left London."

"Hmm Alec said he'd never seen 009 so bent out of shape over an accusation of theft." Considering 009 was known for being something of a minor kleptomaniac off duty it wasn't really a surprise Alec had believed him responsible. That 009 had cared to defend himself from the accusation was odd though. Normally he just smiled and said maybe he did it or maybe he didn't and let people figure it out on their own.

Q lifted his head to glare at Bond properly, knowing he knew exactly what had turned both the other 00's into toddlers fighting over toys. "007, what exactly did you tell Alec when his bottle went missing?" Q wasn't actually sure he wanted know but he wasn't going to take the question back. Better to be informed of bad news than have no news may as well have been the MI6 unofficial motto. 

"Oh nothing really, " Bond's innocent grin was not reassuring, "just that it was sure to be appreciated by the guilty party more than it was by the bottom of Alec's dirty locker." That would do it certainly. 009 was not known to be a connoisseur of alcohol; the opposite in fact. 009 could outdrink an ox and make all the appropriate judgments to tell good from bad and he cared not a whit for any of it. He bought himself rotgut quality in large quantity on the basis that buzzed was buzzed despite having a 00's quite impressive pay. 

To Alec, and to James as well, who enjoyed few fine things in their limited downtime the idea of what was probably a fine bottle of vodka going to waste was more than enough for a short lived grudge to form. 

"Okay," Q agreed easily, "I can see how that would put 006 in snit." He narrowed his eyes. "Now what did you do to 009, because I know you're responsible for his reaction too."

"Well I said 009 was blamed, but obviously it would be tragic if he actually drank it. So I repossessed it for the greater good." Which meant when 009 showed Alec his stash the bottle wasn't there. Off mission 009 stole and collected random things all the time but usually limited himself to things easily replacable but if the owners tracked him down he was usually more than willing to simply hand back their belongings as long as they were relatively polite. 

" So of course Alec accused him of drinking it and wanted a replacement and 009 swore he hadn't but having already admitted he'd nicked it Alec wouldn't believe him. 009 would have probably given it back but this was more fun." Bond seemed delighted at the chaos he'd caused. Then again he always seemed to like the chaos he left in his wake on missions too. 

"Right, and now that I know about the mystery of the missing vodka I've got to not laugh at the both of them next time they come to Q-branch. Thank you ever so much for that, James." Q stood up and chugged back the remainder of his tea, gimacing a little at the taste before leaving the empty cup on the desk for the next day. "Come along then, if you're going to supply me unasked for alcohol it's going to be something better than stolen vodka."

Bond's ears perked up and he rolled smoothly to his feet from where he's been lounging against Q's desk. "Your wish is my command, oh Quartermaster." Bond laughingly replied. 

"Then I order you to meet me at the usual bar. You got yourself in here undetected I expect you can get yourself out the same way." Q started to head for the main exit to Q-branch and chirped back over his shoulder, "I've no interest in being called back for your debrief because you've been spotted. Hopefully you follow these stealth orders better than your usual ones. Cheers, 007."

**Author's Note:**

> That's it. That's all I've got. It's an awkward end but if I didn't end it they'd just keep going about their night and it'd literally never end.
> 
> Edit: So this wasn't very clear and I just jumped right into this verse without explaining any of the background stuff I made up. 
> 
> Ok so by Raptor I mean he's a non-distinct species of bird of prey - not that he's a dinosaur though that'd be cool. That probably wasn't very clear.
> 
> Middle ground, high end and low end I was using to describe how strong their animal attributes were or how affected they were by them. So high end passive avian was very strong bird features of prey type birds (ie. songbirds). I had a bunch of terminology in my head made up for this verse that never got explained here.


End file.
